THE Communist Party of Ireland (CPI) has backed victims’ calls for Britain to come clean over its role in 1974’s Dublin-Monaghan bombings.

Tuesday marked the 42nd anniversary of the attacks by the loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) which killed 33 people — including a pregnant woman near full term.

A wreath-laying ceremony — organised by Justice for the Forgotten, which campaigns for an investigation into alleged British state collusion in the 1974 massacre — was held at the memorial on Talbot Street in Dublin, where one of the three bombs in the capital exploded.

Alan McBride, whose wife Sharon was blown up in the IRA Shankill bomb in 1993, accused Westminster of using national security as a pretext for maintaining its veil of secrecy around the massacre.

Mr McBride, who works with the Wave Trauma Centre in Belfast supporting victims of violence, said: “The families need truth, they need justice and they need support. This is not going to go away.”

Irish Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan said he would continue to demand the original police and security papers be opened, honouring a pledge in the new Dail’s programme for government.

Sinn Fein TD Sean Crowe also submitted a motion on the bombings to the Dail.

“We know that the Dublin and Monaghan bombings were carried out by loyalists with logistical and technical support from British security personnel,” he said.

Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams repeated his call to the British government “to release all information it holds associated with the bombings and to assist the families in ensuring that justice is pursued and delivered.”

CPI general secretary Eugene McCartan said his party supported the call by victims’ families for full disclosure by the British government.

“There is simply too much evidence in the public domain from numerous cases to show that there was much state-directed violence using loyalist paramilitaries as the vehicle to secure Britain’s interests,” he said.

Mr McCartan recalled that the bombing “secured the passing of the most draconian repressive legislation through the Irish Dail at that time.

“The time has long passed for justice for the victims of this horrendous act of state terrorism.”